a calm surrender
by lost in my design
Summary: A month later and Sarah's memory is still spotty. Charah fluff with a tiny bit of angst.


_There's a calm surrender to the rush of day._

…

A month has passed and she still remembers, _truly _remembers, little.

They sit together at night and he tells her stories. Sometimes they are his, less often they are hers, and usually they are theirs. She sits, her knees pulled up to her chest, and watches him as he speaks. Emphatic hand gestures and a brilliant smile always accompany his speech, and sometimes she gets so absorbed in the way he's telling the story that she stops paying attention to the actual words. When he notices her glazing over, he begins to tell elaborate made-up dramas of the daring life of two secret spies. Sometimes she glazes over just so he'll tell her something she recognizes as a lie.

Despite this, she essentially refuses to be touched. They have not kissed since the morning on the beach, and he tries his hardest not to think about it. She's here, he repeats to himself as consolation. She's damaged, but she's home.

Ever the gentleman, he sleeps on the couch to allow her the bed. She protested heavily against this, but he remained on the couch against all her arguments the first night and hasn't moved since. He's sleeping, for the most part. When he's not hearing Sarah cry out in her nightmares, he's sleeping. (When Ellie calls, she can hear the exhaustion in his voice, but she knows he won't listen so she simply worries from Chicago).

It is one such evening, one where he's lying awake to ensure that she doesn't have any nightmares, when she does. She's yelling enough to make him want to go and hold her, but he remains still and tortures himself with images of what she could be seeing.

Her screaming stops after a while, and he wonders if she's alright, or if she's shot up in bed and trying to regain control of her breathing. His feet are itching but he doesn't move, just closes his eyes and lets silence wash over him.

"Chuck?" her voice calls.

In an instant he is sitting up and attempting to disentangle himself from the blankets. "Yeah, Sarah?"

She appears in the kitchen. "I didn't really think you'd be awake," she says.

"Couldn't sleep," he explains, still trying to free himself from the blanket. When he does, he sets it aside. "Are you alright?"

"Why couldn't you sleep?" she asks, taking his blanket and wrapping herself in it.

"Ah," he shrugs, folding his legs underneath him to make room for her. "You know. Too much caffeine."

"I woke you up," she corrects, sitting down at the opposite end of the couch.

He opens his mouth to protest, then shuts it once more. "I was already awake. I haven't slept much lately."

She frowns. "I told you, you can have the bed."

"Absolutely not," he answers. "It's not discomfort."

She looks away. "I keep you up often?"

He wrings his hands and picks at the couch cushion. "What do you dream about?"

She bites her lip. "Tonight I dreamt about you."

"The screaming makes sense, then," he says, trying to get her to laugh.

She looks up at him with eyes full of sorrow. "Did I ever try to kill you?" she asks.

"You…don't remember?" he asks. "That happened after…"

She shook her head, letting her head fall in her hands. "I was hoping it was just a story you told me. I knew it felt real. It had to be real." He's certain there are tears falling, but she won't let him see.

He has to hold his hand to keep himself from reaching out. "Sarah, you didn't know what you were doing. Quinn brainwashed you, made you forget everything you've ever known, even yourself. Even…" He sighs. "Even me."

"I'm so sorry," she mutters. She looks up at him, and her eyes are bloodshot and empty. "I'm so sorry."

He can't find the words, so despite his misgivings, he crosses the distance between them and pulls her into his arms. She buries her head in his shoulder and he rubs slow circles into her back.

"Sometimes I think I remember," she says. "Sometimes I look at you and something flashes from years ago, just something you said or did that comes back. Sometimes I look at you and have no idea who you are." She pulls away so he can see her face. "But every time I look at you, I know I love you, even when I don't know where it's coming from."

He smiled slowly. "It's alright if you don't remember everything. We can always make new memories."

"New memories," she repeats, biting her lip. "You promise you'll be in all of them?"

"I wouldn't miss them for the world," he says.

She hesitates, then leans up to kiss him, and in a way it's their best kiss ever because for her, at least, it feels like the first time, and he's so glad to have her back that he kind of forgets what he's doing, but neither of them really care.

"For the record," he says between kisses, "I love you, too."

She smiles and continues unbuttoning his shirt.

…

_It's enough for this restless warrior_

_Just to be with you_

…

A/N: Thanks for reading, and leave a review if you like.


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